July 2008

Earlier this evening the pro-Karadzic rally called by the Serbian Radical party turned violent (B92 report now online).

It all happened very fast, with a group of hooligans spotting a relatively isolated unit of riot police, putting on masks and attacking.

I think the incident could have been prevented by a more organised police response. The police were deployed side-on to the advancing hooligans (lining the road), and it took their commander way too long to order them to redeploy as a phalanx (lined up across the road).

They also nearly had a perfect opportunity to isolate and arrest the worst troublemakers. At around 21:48, the hooligans were forcing the police back down Makedonska, away from the junction with Decanska. Just then a unit of 30 cops suddenly appeared from Decanska and walked single file into Makedonska, trapping the hooligans between themselves and the other unit, who were now counter attacking. Unfortunately it took those cops too long to figure out that the people running past them were fleeing from their colleagues 200m away. They did eventually try to close the trap but they only managed to arrest 5 or 6 people (giving them a thorough hiding in the process).

Here is my time line from earlier…

21:42 – I am watching live on TV events I can hear right outside my window…Hooligans putting on masks and appearing to tool up on Makedonska.

21:43 – Now attacking cops with firecrackers and bottles.

21:48 – Cops are in a bad position, lined up longways on Makendonska. Another unit walked into it. One firebomb and flares. Cops withdraw down Makedonska towards Politika. Teargas used. Now its stirring up the main crowd at Trg Republika like hornets.

21:49 – Teargas used. Looting on Makedonska. Baton charge!

21:53 – Cops holding (just) corner of Decanska and Makedonska. Stone bins broken up for missiles. Reinforcements in vans heading up 29th November with sirens on.

21:56 – Cops using rubber bullets and flashbangs. Very badly organised. Some running off into battle without support then turning around to exhort their colleagues to follow. Bunched up. Very dangerous if there are petrol bombs.

22:01 – Cops have cleared Makedonska in a series of baton charges. Fighting now on Trg Republika. Ambulances helping wounded cops on Makedonska. Three or four with head injuries. Plain-clothes cops now emerging [ I saw this cop in the orange shirt on B92 chatting to colleagues after this incident]. A commander talking into his radio furiously. A stream of injured cops keeps heading down Makedonska to the staging area near Politika. Two lines holding the mob at the eastern edge of Trg Republika. Massive police reinforcements arriving from Kolarceva (the units guarding Parliament?).

22:04 – Cops being brutal to hooligans they catch but where has the mob gone? I can hear them, sounds like they are on Despota Stefana (29th November). This is dangerous becuase the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) is nearby on Skadarlija. Flashbangs on or near George Washington.

22:18 – Fighting, sirens. Chaos on Republic Square (Trg Republika). News reports fighting on Knez Mihailova street too (the main pedestrian street in Belgrade). Random vandalism and looting on the north eastern side of the square. Police reinforcements seem to be flooding in now. You can tell immediately the difference between the full time (and properly trained) riot police – the Gendarmes – and the ordinary cops-in-armour. The Gendarmes are well organised, orderly and hold a line. They also have blue helmets (not white), smaller blank shields and distinctive red shoulder patches. Here is a Genderme unit guarding Knez Mihailova. The other police units were a rabble. They were very nearly overcome on Makedonska. The fire-bomb panicked them. Tatjana Aleksic (a call in reporter on B92) sounds like she was crying as she described some of the violence (tear gas?)

22:30 – It looks like the expert riot police have taken charge with the rest holding and guarding. There are intermittent bangs from huge fire-crackers or police flashbangs. I think the mob may have headed north west towards Student’s Park (Studenski Trg) and Dorcol. Targets there are the Mosque and possible (although unlikely) the Jewish Center on Kralja Petra, but this afternoon I saw hundreds of riot police posted there. I am hoping they have just dispersed, but somehow I am doubtful even though the rioters were clearly opportunists and not organised at all.

22:31 – I am off out to see what’s up.

23:22 – OK I am back, and I have some great photos and detailed report (to follow).

23:31 – Makedonska and the area around Trg Republika are covered in rubble, but there was no looting there as I previously thought. Not even a broken window. Trg Republika is now quite, guarded by exhausted looking riot cops and the smell of teargas is still strong. There are TV crews and photographers roaming around. A spotted a surprising number of foreigners, I met on group who were loudly asking directions right next to a group of serious hooligans who simply ignored them. There is trouble elsewhere, becuase every now and again the police Intervention Squad (the guys in Range Rovers) would roar through in convoy. There is nothing going on at Makedonska, Trg Republika (Republic Square), Kolarceva and as far as I could see or hear up Terazija. In short, the city centre seems to be safe again. There are lost of ambulances, I saw them loading up at least one guy with a serious head injury. There were a group of police officers desperately trying to find out what had happened to one of their colleagues, six or seven of them on phones and radios trying to get word. I felt very sorry for them, they looked very worried.

23:52 – Cops officially declare situation is under control. About 25 cops and a similar number of protesters injured.

UPDATE: Here are my picture and Videos!

Riot police secure the junction of Makedonska and Decanska streets shortly after violent clashes with hooligan protestors from a pro-Karadzic rally

The view down Makedonska towards where the police positions were. Riot debris covers the road.

Another view of the damage on Makedonska.

The view towards nearby Trg Republika (Republic Square). The hooligans where pushed back onto the square where some of the heaviest fighting took place.

A 15 man riot squad rests shortly after fighting with hooligans at this junction.

The section commander of these cops appeared to be getting instructions by phone. I noticed many police using mobiles and wonder if the police communications system was overwhelmed?

Belgrade’s fancy stone bins were broken up to make missiles for the rioters.

A Russian news crew filming the aftermath.

A Russian news anchor reports live from Belgrade. Seconds after this photos ws taken a group passing hooligans shouted “Hvala Rusija” – Thanks Russia!

An exhausted riot squad guards Trg Republika

A foreign woman gets her son to pose at a smashed bin for a series of pictures. She and her partner were laughing and joking, completely oblivious to the fact that the area was still dangerous, with large groups of angry tear-gassed young men still present.

A well known local drunk showed up carrying this purloined light shade. He was uttetly confused and asked me “What happened here?” (literally “What was here?”, as though it was the work of Godzilla)

Exhausted police rest at a bus stop.

A group of policemen desperately try and get news of an injured colleague via phone and police radio.

One man’s riot debris is another man’s treasure trove. This chap and his partner collect tin cans for recycling (they get a few dinars for each can). The hooligans had kindly upset all the bins so it was a bonus day for him.

B92 TV interviews outraged citizens.

The bad boys of the Serbian police, the notorious Intervention Squad, were rushing around in a 9 vehicle convoy, which is the biggest show of force I have seen from them.

Here are the Intervention squad zooming off in search of troublemakers elsewhere…

Last summer I was enjoying a drink with a friend in his apartment overlooking the Thames and Canary Wharf. His adorable little three year old daughter was entertaining us with songs and dancing and other antics. At one point she sat on his knee and asked what he was drinking. After he told he it was beer she asked if she could taste it, which is what you would expect a curious child to ask. He said yes, but before he could raise the glass to the child’s lips his wife exploded in anger and shouted “No! What are you doing? Do you want them to take her!?”

It transpired that “them” were local social workers who had taken an interest in the child, lets call her M, after they had discovered some bruising on her back (she had fallen). They had subjected her mother to what she describes as fierce interrogation. Why is she so small, is she being fed properly? Where did these bruises come from etc.

Now two minutes with this family would convince anyone that M is both adored and adoring. One might even say as an only child she is bit pampered. M is healthy, her parent are wealthy working professionals and she lacks for nothing. Despite this he mother lives in fear that the social workers will get the wrong idea. Someone swearing in front of the chid caused near panic because she might repeat the word in front of the social worker, same with the beer incident, “what would happen if they found out we gave her beer!”.

It all seemed a bit paranoid to me, so I gently suggested as much. “They are taking children all the time”, M’s mother told me, ” in secret courts. Parents are genuinely scared of messing with these people”.

I knew that the family courts were absurdly cruel to fathers and that Father For Justice were making good progress in righting the injustices there. But secret draconian courts confiscating children. I thought she had lost her mind.

I was wrong.

In December 2006, Camilla Cavendish, a journalist from the Times newspaper, learned of a dreadful case that just gone through the family courts, a routine case of gross injustice that had come to typify the family courts.

The nub of the case is this. A woman, let us call her Janie, gave birth to her first and only child a year ago. That baby was taken away from her and subsequently put up for adoption. Not because of her own failure to care for the baby — her own love and care never seem to have been in question. No. She has lost her baby because of a suspicion that her husband John may have injured another child in his previous marriage almost ten years ago.

The suspicion was no more than that. John was never charged with anything, let alone convicted. Social workers were never sufficiently worried to take that first child into care. Since his divorce John has shared custody of that child perfectly amicably with his ex-wife. Yet the same local authority which left the first child with him has forbidden him to see this new baby. And his new wife, despite having nothing to do with the first case, may never see her baby again. [Family courts are the B-side of the law, The Times, December 21st 2006]

Cavendish was so outraged by this case started investigating the Family Court and the UK’s care system. What she discovered was so shocking that The Times newspaper launched a campaign for justice in the Family Courts.

As readers have found out more about the family Courts and the care system outrage has grown and the campaign had gathered strength. The issue is now finally getting serious political attention.

The Times published three must read articles and a follow-up 10 point plan to restore justice.

When one reads the 10 point plan, one has to marvel that one has to be campaign for these rights and provisions in a court that has the power to take away people’s children, for many a fate worse than death.

Open family courts to the press in all but exceptional circumstances (as recommended by the Constitutional Affairs Select Committee).

Let any parent or carer accused of abuse call any witnesses they need in their defence. At the moment, they are routinely refused permission to do so.

Give automatic permission for parents who are refused legal aid to get a lay adviser to help them present their case. This is routinely refused.

Remove the restrictions that prevent families from talking about their case (as recommended by the Constitutional Affairs Select Committee).

Review the definition of “emotional abuse” across local authorities, to make sure that it cannot become a catch-all for overzealous officials.

Provide an automatic right for parents to receive copies of case conference notes and all evidence used against them in court, just as they would in a criminal trial.

Create an independent body to oversee the actions of social services, with proper sanctions. If that body is to be the General Social Care Council, make it easier for parents to go directly to that body rather than having to face delays from the local authority.

Let children in care waive their right to privacy if they wish to speak out. For gagging children is surely not consistent with promoting their welfare.

Restructure CAFCASS, the Family Court Advisory Service, from being an organisation that reports on the parents to the courts to one that actively promotes the parenting needs of children. The primary focus should cease to be assisting the court process. It should be diverting parents away from contested hearings into the making of parenting plans.

Review the recent legal aid cut-backs that are deterring lawyers from taking on these complex family cases. It is quite wrong that desperate parents are unable to find a lawyer to help them in their time of need.

In June this year author & Balkanologist Misha Glenny was interviewed by B92 about his new book on organized crime “McMafia”.

The interview gives a fascinating insight into the role of organized crime in the Balkans, in particular their central role in the recent Balkan wars.

I have quoted the interview extensively here in a few sample questions:

B92: Can you define the moment when organized crime started to develop, or to proliferate in Serbia, or in the former Yugoslavia?

Glenny: I think that as a process it happened between 1988,1989 and 1991, by the time the war broke out in Croatia and the federal structures had completely collapsed. Then, all sides, particularly Serbia and particularly Croatia, very quickly Macedonia and Slovenia as well had created their paramilitary armies which were indistinguishable from the gangsters on the streets. And it’s no coincidence that all of the major criminal figures, in Serbia or in Croatia, for example, had a role to play in the war as well.

B92: In what way did their cooperation develop during the war?

Glenny: Well, here in Serbia, and in Croatia, and in Bosnia, one of the things that was going on was that the war was used as an excuse for, what one would call in Marxist terms, Primitive Capital Accumulation, i.e. in the battlefields, if the Croat unit or the Serb unit took an area, than, there would be a paramilitary team that would clear it of all its goods.

Television, fridges, whatever they could get their hands on. Sometimes, in the case of Eastern Slavonia, entire vineyards, oilfields and so on, and they would use this to start building up a criminal empire. Now what I felt when I was researching this about the 1990s, is because in the key instances there was a cooperation between gangsters and paramilitaries of all sides, i.e. Croats and Serbs cooperating together, Serbs and Albanians cooperating together in the heroin trade for example, that actually I came to review my belief about what happened in 1990s.

The real engine behind the wars was very little to do with nationalist conflict, and all to do with organized crime. Finding the way of seizing as much economic power in the various areas of the former Yugoslavia as possible, and establishing themselves as the key economic players in these countries.

B92: What was the role of the state? What was the role of the security services in Eastern Europe when it came to the development of organized crime?

Glenny: It was different in the former Yugoslavia from everywhere else. And that is because the slide to war meant that the state remained more powerful in Yugoslavia than it did, say, in neighboring Bulgaria. So, in neighboring Bulgaria, what tended to happen was that large number of security forces in 1989, 1990, were sacked from their jobs, and they were unemployed. They then used their skills of surveillance, creating criminal, or creating underground networks, killing people, smuggling – in Bulgaria, smuggling was very important – they became the new organized crime.

Here in Serbia or in Croatia, it was different because UDBA [former Yugoslav secret service] basically remained intact. It split along national lines obviously, but essentially the networks remained consistent with the state, and what they did was to develop a relationship with the paramilitaries, with the organized crime gangs, and so when you come on to something like cigarette smuggling from 1994 onwards, all of the states were getting their percentage, their cut from allowing the cigarette trade to go on through. They became mutually dependent.

B92: You say in your book that the Russians love their Slavic brothers, but that in the world of organized crime and weapons trade, one could hardly notice that.

Glenny: This is really important for me. The realization. When looking at the arms flows coming out of Ukraine and Russia, once the arms embargo was imposed on all republics of the former Yugoslavia, the amount of weaponry that went into Croatia from Ukraine and Russia is really quite astonishing. It was their primary source, the largest percentage of weapons coming into Croatia came from Russia and Ukraine and so, you know, it’s an example of how the mythology of strong political bond between, say, Moscow and Belgrade, is just that. When it comes to money, nationalism plays really insignificant role.

B92: Can you describe the role our criminals had in the development of organized crime? What was the role of the criminals from the former Yugoslavia?

Glenny: It was the very important role. And the reason why it was the important role is partly because of the specific function of the transit zone. For drugs, for women, for cigarettes, all going to the European Union, and it’s important to remember that this trade in Europe was driven by the huge demand of the EU citizens for drugs, illegal migrant labor, women, and so on… and it had a very important role there.

But, the other thing was the issue of the war, as a smoke screen for this activity, the so called fog of war), and also after the imposition of sanctions on the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, i.e. Serbia and Montenegro. Those sanctions were a disaster. Because Serbia and Montenegro were self sufficient in food, all they needed to get was oil, and all the surrounding countries were very, very weak, going through tough transitions. So over night in 1992, you’ve created the Pan-Balkan Mafia.

This was where the Bulgarians the Serbs, the Croats, the Romanians, the Hungarians, the Greeks, the Albanians, everyone became involved in supply of oil to Serbia, and then in order to finance the wars, the transit of goods and services out through the Balkans and into the EU. And that was an absolutely massive increase. Now, this all drew the attention of secret services in the European Union and the United States. They knew that there was a hell of a lot going on in the Balkans, they didn’t exactly know what to do about it, but its role in the 1990s, and in the first few years of the post millennium period, the “naughties” as we called them, was really important.

B92: You have dedicated the last chapter of your book to the future of organized crime. How is it different from what it is today?

Glenny: ….It is interesting for me to observe Bulgaria, where criminal elements are at this time more powerful than in Serbia, but Bulgaria is now an EU members. I think that organized crime and its power in Serbia are directly connected to Serbia’s links with the EU. If Serbia becomes an EU member, it will receive all sorts of incentives that are perhaps not visible now, but that are necessary, above all financial injections into the economically devastated areas. These areas are southern Serbia for example, near the borders. These are the generators of organized crime.

There’s Belgrade, too, of course, where most of the money is. If Serbia becomes an EU members, the organized crime problem will slowly diminish in the 10 to 15-year period. That has happed in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, to a lesser degree in Poland, although that’s a specific problem. I’m sure it will happen in Bulgaria too. EU membership will destroy organized crime or bring it to an acceptable level. If, however Serbia remains outside the EU, then possibilities for organized crime to consolidate and increase its influence in the country will open up. [From B92 – Insight – Off the air – “Criminals, key business players”]

In June this year author & Balkanologist Misha Glenny was interviewed by B92 about his new book on organized crime “McMafia”.

The interview gives a fascinating insight into the role of organized crime in the Balkans, in particular their central role in the recent Balkan wars.

I have quoted the interview extensively here in a few sample questions:

B92: Can you define the moment when organized crime started to develop, or to proliferate in Serbia, or in the former Yugoslavia?

Glenny: I think that as a process it happened between 1988,1989 and 1991, by the time the war broke out in Croatia and the federal structures had completely collapsed. Then, all sides, particularly Serbia and particularly Croatia, very quickly Macedonia and Slovenia as well had created their paramilitary armies which were indistinguishable from the gangsters on the streets. And it’s no coincidence that all of the major criminal figures, in Serbia or in Croatia, for example, had a role to play in the war as well.

B92: In what way did their cooperation develop during the war?

Glenny: Well, here in Serbia, and in Croatia, and in Bosnia, one of the things that was going on was that the war was used as an excuse for, what one would call in Marxist terms, Primitive Capital Accumulation, i.e. in the battlefields, if the Croat unit or the Serb unit took an area, than, there would be a paramilitary team that would clear it of all its goods.

Television, fridges, whatever they could get their hands on. Sometimes, in the case of Eastern Slavonia, entire vineyards, oilfields and so on, and they would use this to start building up a criminal empire. Now what I felt when I was researching this about the 1990s, is because in the key instances there was a cooperation between gangsters and paramilitaries of all sides, i.e. Croats and Serbs cooperating together, Serbs and Albanians cooperating together in the heroin trade for example, that actually I came to review my belief about what happened in 1990s.

The real engine behind the wars was very little to do with nationalist conflict, and all to do with organized crime. Finding the way of seizing as much economic power in the various areas of the former Yugoslavia as possible, and establishing themselves as the key economic players in these countries.

B92: What was the role of the state? What was the role of the security services in Eastern Europe when it came to the development of organized crime?

Glenny: It was different in the former Yugoslavia from everywhere else. And that is because the slide to war meant that the state remained more powerful in Yugoslavia than it did, say, in neighboring Bulgaria. So, in neighboring Bulgaria, what tended to happen was that large number of security forces in 1989, 1990, were sacked from their jobs, and they were unemployed. They then used their skills of surveillance, creating criminal, or creating underground networks, killing people, smuggling – in Bulgaria, smuggling was very important – they became the new organized crime.

Here in Serbia or in Croatia, it was different because UDBA [former Yugoslav secret service] basically remained intact. It split along national lines obviously, but essentially the networks remained consistent with the state, and what they did was to develop a relationship with the paramilitaries, with the organized crime gangs, and so when you come on to something like cigarette smuggling from 1994 onwards, all of the states were getting their percentage, their cut from allowing the cigarette trade to go on through. They became mutually dependent.

B92: You say in your book that the Russians love their Slavic brothers, but that in the world of organized crime and weapons trade, one could hardly notice that.

Glenny: This is really important for me. The realization. When looking at the arms flows coming out of Ukraine and Russia, once the arms embargo was imposed on all republics of the former Yugoslavia, the amount of weaponry that went into Croatia from Ukraine and Russia is really quite astonishing. It was their primary source, the largest percentage of weapons coming into Croatia came from Russia and Ukraine and so, you know, it’s an example of how the mythology of strong political bond between, say, Moscow and Belgrade, is just that. When it comes to money, nationalism plays really insignificant role.

B92: Can you describe the role our criminals had in the development of organized crime? What was the role of the criminals from the former Yugoslavia?

Glenny: It was the very important role. And the reason why it was the important role is partly because of the specific function of the transit zone. For drugs, for women, for cigarettes, all going to the European Union, and it’s important to remember that this trade in Europe was driven by the huge demand of the EU citizens for drugs, illegal migrant labor, women, and so on… and it had a very important role there.

But, the other thing was the issue of the war, as a smoke screen for this activity, the so called fog of war), and also after the imposition of sanctions on the then Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, i.e. Serbia and Montenegro. Those sanctions were a disaster. Because Serbia and Montenegro were self sufficient in food, all they needed to get was oil, and all the surrounding countries were very, very weak, going through tough transitions. So over night in 1992, you’ve created the Pan-Balkan Mafia.

This was where the Bulgarians the Serbs, the Croats, the Romanians, the Hungarians, the Greeks, the Albanians, everyone became involved in supply of oil to Serbia, and then in order to finance the wars, the transit of goods and services out through the Balkans and into the EU. And that was an absolutely massive increase. Now, this all drew the attention of secret services in the European Union and the United States. They knew that there was a hell of a lot going on in the Balkans, they didn’t exactly know what to do about it, but its role in the 1990s, and in the first few years of the post millennium period, the “naughties” as we called them, was really important.

B92: You have dedicated the last chapter of your book to the future of organized crime. How is it different from what it is today?

Glenny: ….It is interesting for me to observe Bulgaria, where criminal elements are at this time more powerful than in Serbia, but Bulgaria is now an EU members. I think that organized crime and its power in Serbia are directly connected to Serbia’s links with the EU. If Serbia becomes an EU member, it will receive all sorts of incentives that are perhaps not visible now, but that are necessary, above all financial injections into the economically devastated areas. These areas are southern Serbia for example, near the borders. These are the generators of organized crime.

There’s Belgrade, too, of course, where most of the money is. If Serbia becomes an EU members, the organized crime problem will slowly diminish in the 10 to 15-year period. That has happed in the Czech Republic, Hungary, Slovakia, to a lesser degree in Poland, although that’s a specific problem. I’m sure it will happen in Bulgaria too. EU membership will destroy organized crime or bring it to an acceptable level. If, however Serbia remains outside the EU, then possibilities for organized crime to consolidate and increase its influence in the country will open up. [From B92 – Insight – Off the air – “Criminals, key business players”]

Yesterday afternoon I decided to attend one of the daily protests in support of Radovan Karadzic that are being organized by Serbian ultra-nationalists.

Here are a selection of pictures from the event, which was entirely peaceful, but in many ways utterly bizarre, especially when Mladic showed up…

A riot police staging position near Studenski Trg (Student's Square). These vans are parked about 300m away from Trg Republika (Republic Square) where the rally is takling place.

One of the strangest things about the rally was the music. This was the scene playing out as I arrived, about 20 minutes before the rally started in earnest. The music is, to my ear at least, unmistakeably Arabo-Turkic. I have always be surprised at just how Turkish so much of the radical nationalist music and culture seems to be.

The children in the picture were dancing a traditional dance just before this photo was taken.

Here is another eulogy to Karadzic, also sung in an Arabp-Turkic way

A man wearing a karadzic tshirt looks on as marshals prepare for the rally.

Protesters line up and sing patriotic songs

A weeping woman gives a three fingered nationalist gesture to onlookers

Older people made up the majority of the protesters. There were also some tough looking young men and a few families, but the families looked like they had come up to Belgrade from the Republika Srpska.

The man on the left standard Serbian three fingered salute. The man on the right is making a strange new three fingered salute used by many protesters later.

The crowd was smaller than this picture suggests

The view from the podium

A riot policeman jokes with colleagues. The police outnumbered the protetsors three to one.

A grinning man gestures to his poster of Radovan Karadzic.

A priest chats to a lady in the crowd. He later joined the protest leaders on the podium.

This man stood there for hours holding his newspaper above his head. The old and the poor seemed to make up the bulk of the people at the protest.

A severe looking young man from 1389.org.yu keeps an eye on the crowd. To his left a man wears a Putin t-shirt. Russia remains the great hope for these protestors.

Some onlookers wore clothes that matched their political eccentricities.

From this angle you can see the protest was tiny.

When the rally got under way in earnest, people gathered behind the speakers to sing patriotic songs then listen to the speeches. Notice the priest in the middle of teh picture in front of the man with the yellow shirt.

The rally appeared to end with some obligatory chants of “Ra-do-van Kara-dzic”

A phalanx of riot police standing-by near the protest. The speech-makers specifically appealled to the crowd not to drink, not to commit any acts of aggression or crimes and to leave the police and journalists alone.

Another squad of riot police, but they were hidden around a corner away from the rally. Notice that their shields are different from the unit near the rally, suggesting that these are a reserve riot squad (ordinary cops in riot kit) not the specialised Gendermes.

Yesterday afternoon I decided to attend one of the daily protests in support of Radovan Karadzic that are being organized by Serbian ultra-nationalists.

Here are a selection of pictures from the event, which was entirely peaceful, but in many ways utterly bizarre, especially when Mladic showed up…

A riot police staging position near Studenski Trg (Student’s Square). These vans are parked about 300m away from Trg Republika (Republic Square) where the rally is taking place.

This was the scene playing out as I arrived, about 20 minutes before the rally started in earnest. The music is, to my ear at least, unmistakeably Turkish. I have always be surprised at just how Turkish so much of the radical nationalist music and culture seems to be, even though it is completely understandable after 500 years of Turkish occupation. The instrument you hear being played is a Gusle, the same one played by Karadzic in his favourite pub in Belgrade.

The children in the picture were dancing a traditional dance just before this photo was taken.

Here is another eulogy to Karadzic, also sung in a distinctively middle eastern / Turkish way:

A man wearing a Karadzic t-shirt looks on as marshals prepare for the rally.

Protesters line up and sing patriotic songs

A weeping woman gives a three fingered nationalist gesture to onlookers

Older people made up the majority of the protesters. There were also some tough looking young men and a few families, but the families looked like they had come up to Belgrade from the Republika Srpska.

The man on the left standard Serbian three fingered salute. The man on the right is making a strange new three fingered salute used by many protesters later.

The crowd was smaller than this picture suggests

The view from the podium

A riot policeman jokes with colleagues. The police outnumbered the protesters three to one.

A grinning man gestures to his poster of Radovan Karadzic.

A priest chats to a lady in the crowd. He later joined the protest leaders on the podium.

This man stood there for hours holding his newspaper above his head. The old and the poor seemed to make up the bulk of the people at the protest.

A severe looking young man from 1389.org.yu keeps an eye on the crowd. To his left a man wears a Putin t-shirt. Russia remains the great hope for these protesters.

Some onlookers wore clothes that matched their political eccentricities.

From this angle you can see the protest was tiny.

When the rally got under way in earnest, people gathered behind the speakers to sing patriotic songs then listen to the speeches. Notice the priest in the middle of teh picture in front of the man with the yellow shirt.

The rally appeared to end with some obligatory chants of “Ra-do-van Kara-dzic”

A phalanx of riot police, known locally as “Ninja Turtles”, standing-by near the protest. The speech-makers specifically appealed to the crowd not to drink, not to commit any acts of aggression or crimes and to leave the police and journalists alone.

Another squad of riot police (aka “Ninja Turtles”), but they were hidden around a corner away from the rally. Notice that their shields are different from the unit near the rally, suggesting that these are a reserve riot squad (ordinary cops in riot kit) not the specialised Gendermes.

LONDON — Serbia is one of the most attractive developing markets countries, according to this year’s PwC EM20 Index.

The PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) index shows once again that in addition to the so-called BRIC group (Brazil, Russia, India and China), which continue to offer interesting investment opportunities, there are other locations which also offer an attractive alternative for British companies which want to invest in the growing markets in the world, the PwC said in a statement.

A PwC official said that political risk was the deciding factor for the rise and fall of countries on this list and that this especially referred to Serbia, which had dramatically improved its position on the list primarily owing to greater political stability after the year 2000.